The L.A. Times Festival of Books at UCLA is back this weekend — it’s always a great event, and this year more than 100,000 people are expected.  I’ll be moderating a panel Sunday at 11am in Haines Hall 39 on “CLIMATE IN CRISIS” featuring
–Stephan Faris, author of FORECAST: The Consequences of Climate Change, from the Amazon to the Arctic, from Darfur to Napa Valley
–Edward Humes, author of ECO-BARONS: The Dreamers, Schemers and Millionaires who are Saving our Planet;
–William J. Kelley, co-author of SMOGTOWN: The Lung-Burning History of Pollution in Los Angeles;
–Daniel Sperling, co-author of TWO BILLION CARS: Driving Toward Sustainability.

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For our Festival of Books preview show, we’ll feature LATimes columnist STEVE LOPEZ – the film of his book “THE SOLOIST” opens Friday in LA, it’s the story of a homeless violin player on skid row and the newspaper columnist who becomes friends with him – starring Jamie Fox and Robert Downey Jr.  Steve will be speaking at the BookFest Sunday at 1:30 on a panel moderated by film critic Ella Taylor.  (originally broadcast 4/16/08)

Also: DAVID ULIN, book review editor of the LA Times, will talk about the troubles in the book business, and the troubles at the LA Times – he’ll be speaking at the BookFest Saturday at 130 on “Publishing 3.0”; Saturday at 330 with Columbine author Dave Cullen, and Sunday at 10:30 he’ll be moderating a fiction panel.

Plus: The Black Girl Next Door: that’s the title of a powerful new memoir by JENNIFER BAZILE, she was the first black female professor of history at Yale – and she’s been named one of “thirty leaders of the future” by Ebony magazine. She’ll be talking about growing up black and middle class in LA in the seventies at the BookFest Sunday at 1:30.  (originally broadcast 1/14/09)

. . . and I’ll be moderating a panel on “Climate in Crisis” Sunday at 11 in Haines Hall 39.

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“I would like to give young people solid intellectual, historical support for saying ‘screw you’” – that’s what ANDREI  CODRESCU says, he’s the poet and NPR commentator from New Orleans.  In pursuit of that goal, he has come up with “impractical guide to practical living” – seeing the 20th century as a battle between radical visions of art and revolution: one the one hand, the creative and the absurd; on the other, reason and order. His new book is The Posthuman Dada Guide.
Andrei Codrescu will be speaking in the ALOUD series at the downtown LA Public Library on Tues April 28, 7:00pm.
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Plus: “America hasn’t led on RENEWABLE ENERGY since Jimmy Carter left office and Ronald Reagan ripped out the solar panels from the White House” – that’s what EDWARD HUMES says. Obama knows what has to be done – but an intractable opposition is working to block aggressive government intervention. The Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist talks about the environmental heroes of our age. His new book is ECO BARONS: The Dreamers, Schemers, and Millionaires who are Saving our Planet.
He’ll be speaking at the LA Times Festival of Books Sunday April 26 at 11:00am in Haines 39.l

ALSO: SMOGTOWN – Los Angeles, where the enemy “came from within” – from the car-addicted suburban lifestyle that took off after WWII. Environmental journalists CHIP JACOBS and BILL KELLY tell the story of the corporate-tainted science, the immense health costs, and the attempts at cleanup. Their new book is Smogtown: The Lung-Burning History of Pollution in Los Angeles. They will be speaking at the LA Times Festival of Books Sunday April 26 at 11:00am in Haines 39.

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HAROLD MEYERSON reports that the presidents of the two labor federations and of the nation’s 12 largest unions — including the National Education Association, which heretofore has not belonged to any labor federation – yesterday announced the formation of the National Labor Coordinating Committee, an interim body that could pave the way for labor’s reunification by forming a new federation with roughly 16 million members. Harold writes for the Washington Post op-ed page; he also editor-at-large of The American Prospect.

Also: “A MY LAI A MONTH” – NICK TURSE has uncovered crucial evidence that the My Lai Massacre was not an isolated incident, but rather part of a large pattern of US killing of unarmed Vietnamese people. Nick’s article for The Nation, “A My Lai a Month,” won a special Ridenhour Prize for reportorial distinction.

Plus: Dreamers, Believers, Builders, and Killers in California: MARK ARAX breaks with the cliches about California’s sunshine and beaaches with stories reporting on migrant workers from Oaxaca, racism and craziness in the Central Valley, marijuana moguls in Humbold County, and the foreclosure crisis. Mark’s new book is West of the West.
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He’ll be reading and signing at Skylight Books, 1818 N. Vermont Ave in LA, Wed nite at 730pm.

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Legendary investigative reporter SEYMOUR HERSH says Obama’s best chance for restarting the Mideast peace process is mediating talks between Israel and Syria.  Syria’s president Bashar Assad told Hersh that despite Israel’s war on Gaza, he is very interested in closing a deal on the Golan Heights.  Hersh writes about “Syria Calling” in this week’s issue of The New Yorker.

Plus: in Agfhanistan and Pakistan,  TOM ENGELHARDT says, the US is  “trading in a limited war in a mountainous, poverty-stricken country of 27 million people for one in an advanced nation of 167 million, with a crumbling economy, rising extremism, advancing corruption, and a large military armed with nuclear weapons.”  Tom wrote about “The Great Afghan Bailout” for his indispensable website TomDispatch.com.

Also: What a billion Muslims really think:  the Gallup poll did 50,000 interviews with Muslims  in 35 countries, and found that Muslims and Americans are equally likely to reject attacks on civilians as morally unjustifiable; that large majorities of Muslims would guarantee free speech if it were up to them to write a new constitution — and they say religious leaders should have no direct role in drafting that constitution. DALIA MOGAHED will explain — she’s Executive Director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies and co-author of Who Speaks for Islam? What a Billion Muslims Really Think.

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Hunting the Mortgage Predators: BOBBI MURRAY will report on the mortgage-backed securities business and how it propelled the aggressive marketing of hideously risky loan “products.” Bobbi has reported on politics, economics, police reform and healthcare issues for Los Angeles magazine, The Nation and LA Weekly, and she’s a contributor to the new book Meltdown: How Greed and Corruption Shattered our Financial System and How We Can Recover.

Also: RICHARD PRICE talks about his novel LUSH LIFE – it’s out now in paperback, and it’s about intersecting worlds on the Lower East Side: yuppies, Chinese immigrants, kids from the projects, old Jews, and of course the cops.  Michael Chabon calls Richard Price “one of the best writers of dialogue in the history of American literature.”
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Plus: the KPFK Dodger preview!  DAVE ZIRIN is sports columnist for The Nation magazine, their first sports writer in 150 years of existence. He also writes for the L.A. Times and The Progressive; his new book is A People’s History of Sports in the United States – and we’ve seen him recently on the Rachel Maddow show. 

More stuff to read: my new post at TheNation.com, “Obama’s ‘Katrina Moment’?  Never Mind.”

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“We cannot attract and retain the best and brightest talent,” AIG says, unless they pay those bonuses — $165 million. Barney Frank had the best and brightest reply: on the Rachel Maddow Show Monday night, he said: “I don’t want to retain them.” JOHN NICHOLS will comment – he’s Washington correspondent for The Nation, and writes “The Beat” blog at TheNation.com.

Also: Obama’s economic stimulus provided NOTHING for New Orleans hurricane recovery or flood protection.  For a reminder on what Katrina and President Bush did to New Orleans, we’ll speak with DAN BAUM – after Hurricane Katrina he moved to New Orleans to write about the city’s response to the disaster for The New Yorker.  His new book Nine Lives reveals the hidden history of a haunted and beloved city told through the intersecting lives of nine remarkable characters.

Plus: novelist PETER CAREY has won two Booker prizes: the first for Oscar and Lucinda, which was made into a movie starring Ralph Fiennes and Cate Blanchett; the second for The True History of the Kelly Gang, which sold two million copies worldwide. Now his tenth novel is out in paperback: His Illegal Self, which tells the story a seven-year-old boy whose parents are part of the Weather Underground.  (Originally broadcast 3-12-08)

More stuff to read: My new piece at TheNation.com, “AIG’s ‘Best and Brightest.’”

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How a well-connected oil company revolutionized the way America makes war – and why Obama still needs them: PRATAP CHATTERJEE talks about the past and future of Halliburton and its former subsidiary KBR.  Pratap is the managing editor of CorpWatch and has written for the Financial Times, the Guardian and The Independent of London. He recently appeared on the Rachel Maddow show, where he talked about his new book Halliburton’s Army.

Also: Your Minnesota Moment: Remember Franken & Davis on the old Saturday Night Live? Al Franken’s comedy partner TOM DAVIS will talk about how they met in prep school in Minneapolis, went on to SNL, and why Al ran for Senate and Tom didn’t. Tom’s new book is Thirty-Nine Years of Short Term Memory Loss. He’ll be in conversation with Laraine Newman Thurs Mar. 19, 7:30pm at Writers Bloc at the Writers Guild Theater, 135 South Doheny Dr., Beverly Hills.

Plus: The old, weird American music: Art Rosenbaum’s “Art of Field Recording” vol. 1 won the Grammy for best historical album; now v. II is out. We’ll speak with Lance Ledbetter, who produced the new 4-CD set for Dust-to-Digital.
READ the New Yorker article HERE.
PLAYLIST: “Garfield”-Jack Staggers, 1981; “Brother you ought t’ve been there”-Nathaniel Mitchell, 1979; “John Henry”–Lawrence Eller, 1978; “John Henry”–Mose Parker, 1961; “Old Joe Clark”-Helen McDuffie, 2007.

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Hillary In Ramallah: Sec. of State Clinton visited Palestinian leaders on the West Bank this morning — for comment and some historical perspective, we turn to RASHID KHALIDI, he holds the Edward Said Chair in Arab Studies at Columbia University, and his new book is Sowing Crisis: The Cold War and American Dominance in the Middle East.

And: Socialism in Washington?  “We’re all socialists now,” says Newsweek. HAROLD MEYERSON of the Washington Post op-ed page isn’t so sure: “I’ve still encountered just two avowed democratic socialists in my daily rounds through the nation’s capital: Vermont‘s Sen. Bernie Sanders . . . and  the guy I see in the mirror when I shave,” he says.

Plus: Honeymoon in Tehran: a report on love and danger in the Islamic Republic: we’ll speak with Azadeh Moaveni — she was pregnant and unmarried in Iran last year — not a good place to be.  And she attended government sex ed classes for brides-to-be.  She also reported on Iran’s nuclear program for Time magazine.

More stuff to read: my new piece in The Nation, “Opening the Files on Bush’s Secrets.”  A Freedom of Information wish list: What did Treasury do with the TARP money? Who authorized torture? Plus, warrantless wiretap targets, FEMA’s Katrina records and White House e-mail.